How love is the central message of NDEs, how NDEs spin love in unique ways, how loving others can and does change the world, and how near-death experiencers, like everyone else, often wildly miss the mark, sometimes in humorous ways, when it comes to expressing love in this world.

Take Away:

Seriously, let this sink in: When we truly love one another, we change the world in epic, earth-shaking, miracle-producing ways. This is God’s plan for healing ourselves and healing our world. This is where our greatest sense of happiness, fulfillment, and joy lie. The entire universe is effected by loving thoughts and actions.

Class Description:

The class began with us listening to comments about three fantastic life reviews. The first comes from NDE Researcher/Author Kenneth Ring (which we watched). The second from NDEr Howard Storm (which I read). And the third from NDEr Tom Sawyer (which I also read).

“The angels and Jesus shared their feelings of joy with me when love was expressed, and they shared their disappointment and sadness when we hurt one another…”

“The angels and Jesus had no interest in the track meet competitions I won or lost. They were interested in the relationships and how we encouraged or hurt one another.”

“God is not particularly interested in human sexual expression. God is interested in how we love one another and doesn’t want us to exploit one another. The sexual revolution that I grew up in was opposed to love by promoting counterfeit sexual love as true love. This cultural wave of hedonism was bathed in alcohol and drugs, which are an even further departure from love and the will of God.”

“I had to turn away numerous times when I saw myself treating my children in unloving ways. The most unloving thing that I did was to be at times so obsessed with my concerns that I was indifferent to their needs. I am so sorry for the occasions that I was impatient or cruel to my daughter and son. The most disturbing behaviors in my life review were the times when I cared more about my career as an artist and college professor than about their need to be loved. The emotional abandonment of my children was devastating to review. It was horrifying to see how I had become to much like my father, putting status and success above everything else.”

“The only reason I could bear to proceed with the life review was because of their love for me. No matter what we watched me do in life, they communicated their love for me, even as they expressed their disapproval of things I did.”

When I finished reading these, I re-read this comment, which I would bring up later when we watched two videos of NDErs telling their stories while ignoring children:

“The most unloving thing that I did was to be at times so obsessed with my concerns that I was indifferent to their needs… The most disturbing behaviors in my life review were the times when I cared more about my career as an artist and college professor than about their need to be loved.”

I know that I experienced a total life review, but I have never been able to fit it properly into any of that basic chronology. It had to have happened from the center of the tunnel or the movement within the tunnel, prior to what I call the confrontation with The Light. And the best way to describe it is to give you an example.

When I was around eight years old my father told me to mow the law and cut the weeds in the yard. We had a cottage in the back and a double house in the front. Aunt Gay, my mother’s sister, lived in the cottage out back. Aunt Gay is a very delightful person; she’s a friend of mine as well as my aunt. Aunt Gay was very clever, as was my mother I’m sure it’s a genealogical trait! Everybody liked Aunt Gay. She was always fun to be with. Certainly all the kids thought she was a cool person to know. She had described to me her plans for some wild flowers that grew on little vines in the backyard. “Leave them alone now, Tom,” she said, “and as soon as they blossom we’ll make tiaras for all the girls, and flower necklaces for some of the guys.” And then everybody could pitch in and she’d teach them how to weave such things. That was typical of her. We were looking forward to that.

However, my father told me to mow the lawn and cut the weeds. Now, I had several choices. I could explain to my father that Aunt Gay wanted the weeds left to grow in this particular area. If he said to cut them all, I could have explained to Aunt Gay that father had just told me to mow the lawn and said to cut that patch of weeds. I could ask if she wanted to make her request to my father. Or, I could methodically and deliberately go ahead and mow the yard and cut the weeds. I did that. Well, worse that that, I even came up with a name for the job. I called it “Operation Chop-Chop.” I deliberately decided to be bad, to be malicious. And I went ahead, feeling the authority that my father gave me when he told me to cut the grass and the weeds.

I thought, “Wow, I got away with it; I did it. And if Aunt Gay ever says anything I’ll just tell her father told me to do it. Or if father asks me I’ll say, well that’s what you told me to do.” And I would be vindicated. It would be okay; it would be a perfect Operation Chop-Chop. End of story. My Aunt Gay never said a word to me; nothing was every mentioned; I got away with it totally.

Guess what? I not only relived it in my life review, but I relived every exact thought and attitude; even the air temperature and things that I couldn’t have possibly measured when I was eight years old. For example, I wasn’t aware of how many mosquitoes were in the area. In the life review, I could have counted the mosquitoes. Everything was more accurate than could possibly be perceived in the reality of the original event.

I not only re-experienced my eight-year-old attitude and the kind of excitement and joy of getting away with something, but I was also observing this entire event as a thirty-three-year-old adult; with the wisdom and philosophy I was able to attain by that time. But it was more than that.

I also experienced it exactly as though I was Aunt Gay, several days later after the weeds had been cut, when she walked out the back door. I knew the series of thoughts that bounced back and forth in her mind.

“Oh my goodness, what has happened? Oh well, he must have forgotten. But he couldn’t have forgotten, everyone was looking forward to — Oh no, knock it off. Tommy is… He’s never done anything like that. I love him so Oh, come on, cut it out. Gee, it was so important. He had to know … he couldn’t have known.”

Back and forth, back and forth, between thinking of the possibility, and saying to herself:

“Well, it is possible. No, Tommy isn’t like that. It doesn’t matter anyway, I love him. I’ll never mention it. God forbid, if he did forget and I remind him, that will hurt his feelings. But I think that he did, though. Should I confront him with it and just ask him?”

Thought-pattern after thought-pattern. What I’m telling you is, I was in my Aunt Gay’s body, I was in her eyes, I was in her emotions, I was in her unanswered questions. I experienced the disappointment, the humiliation. It was very devastating to me. It changed my attitude quite a bit as I experienced it.

I experienced things that cannot be perceived. I watched me mowing the law from straight above, anywhere from several hundred to a couple of thousand feet, as though I were a camera. I watched all of that. I was able to perceive and feel and know everything about my Aunt Gay regarding our relationship in that general time frame and regarding Operation Chop-Chop.

In addition to this, and what is probably more important, spiritually speaking, I was able to observe the scene, absolutely, positively, unconditionally. In other words, not with the horrendous emotional ill-feelings that my Aunt Gay experienced not knowing for sure, and yet being afraid to question for fear that she would inflict some kind of dis-ease, or ill feelings on my part. God forbid, if I did it by accident and her reminder would hurt my feelings. And yet she experienced hurt in losing the flowering weeds, not being able to do the things for all the children she had promised, and constantly questioning whether I could have done it on purpose. I did experience that in this unconditional way, with this unconditional love that is only God’s eyes, or the eyes of Jesus Christ, or the light of Jesus, or the light of Buddha enlightened, the spiritual entity.

It is that combination that is God unconditionally, not “Boy, Tom, you sure did a good rip-off,” or “There, Tom, now do you feel bad enough?” Or, “You sure were bad.”

None of that, only, as in the eyes of God, simple, pure, scientific observation, complete, totally, non-attachment. No judgmental aspect whatever. This is simultaneous with the total devastation of what I created in my aunt’s life. And the arrogance, the snide little thoughts, the bad feelings, and the excitement of what I created in my own life at that young age, that was one event.

I wish that I could tell you how it really felt and what the life review is like, but I’ll never be able to do it accurately. I’m hoping to give you just a slight inkling of what is available to each and every one of you. Will you be totally devastated by the crap you’ve brought into other people’s lives? Or will you be equally enlightened and uplifted by the love and joy that you have shared in other people’s lives?

Well, guess what? It pretty much averages itself out. You will be responsible for yourself, judging and reliving what you have done to everything and everybody in very far-reaching ways. Very small, seemingly inconsequential things such as the day when I, nine years old, walked through Seneca Park and loved the appearance of a tree. In my life review I could experience a bit of what the tree experienced in my loving it, two little photons of love and adoration. It was somewhat like the leaves acknowledging my presence. Can a tree experience that? Yes, it can. Don’t go kicking trees anymore!

You do have that effect on plants. You do have an effect on animals. You do have an effect on the universe. And in your life review you’ll be the universe and experience yourself in what you call your lifetime and how it affects the universe. In your life review you’ll be yourself absolutely, in every aspect of time, in every event, in the over-all scheme of things in your lifetime. Your life.

The little bugs on your eyelids that some of you don’t even know exist. That’s an interrelationship, you with yourself and these little entities that are living and surviving on your eyelids. When you waved a loving goodbye to a good friend the other day, did you affect the clouds up above? Did you actually affect them? Does a butterfly’s wings in China affect the weather here? You better believe it does? You can learn all of that in a life review!

As this takes place, you have total knowledge. You have the ability to be a psychologist, a psychiatrist, a psychoanalyst, and much more. You are your own spiritual teacher, maybe for the first and only time in your life. You are simultaneously the student and the teacher in a relationship.

My life review was part of this experience also. It was absolutely, positively, everything basically from the first breath of life right through the accident. It was everything.

During this life review I experienced what I can only describe as “in the eyes of Jesus Christ.” Meaning, I watched and observed this entire event as if I were in the eyes of Jesus Christ. Which means unconditionally.

It does not mean, “Gee, Tom, by being Christ-like, you don’t hit people, you love people.”

No to that. Nor was it, “Wow, God has really made you a very good specimen and your reflexes are superior. You did an excellent job in beating that man up.”

No to that either. It’s not judgmental or negative. I can’t describe it other than with the unconditional love of Christ, the Christ who has absolute unconditional love. You will have the experience of observing something without any emotion or righteousness, or judgmental attachments. You will be able to observe history only as history, without the emotional attachments to the facts and figures. I want to also say that, to offset that, there were experiences of absolute love and joy…

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After reading and watching these three general life reviews, we listened to two near-death experiencers Reinee Pasarow and Dianne Morrissey empathize how surprisingly important the little things in life are — the small, seemingly unimportant acts of love, kindness, and compassion. Reinee Pasarow also emphasizes, as many other near-death experiences do, that our intentions are very important and that our thoughts and actions affect the entire universe.

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The next two videos come from near-death experiencers who were attempting to share their stories by making YouTube videos. In both videos, the experiencers are interrupted by children and instead of changing gears and dealing patiently and lovingly with the children in question, they respond impatiently. Remember the quote I mentioned above:

“The most unloving thing that I did was to be at times so obsessed with my concerns that I was indifferent to their needs… The most disturbing behaviors in my life review were the times when I cared more about my career as an artist and college professor than about their need to be loved.”

While it’s funny to watch others, especially near-death experiencers who are talking about light and love, violate the prime directive, how many of us do the same thing every day? I still do and, in fact, told the class how after I had discovered these two videos and shared them with my partner, the very next day I caught myself ignoring her when she needed help because I was preoccupied with one of my earth-changing projects. Alas, learning how to be lovingly present at all times, and in all situations, is a very tall order indeed…

Watch what happens in this video from 32:27 to 33:33. Notable quote: “Sorry, my daughter is ruining my YouTube video.”

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Finally, I shared one of the most profound near-death experience stories every recorded. Another story from Howard Storm, this encounter with Jesus illustrates several very important ideas:

1. The universal tendency among human beings to miss the central point of NDEs — instead of engaging in the hard work of genuinely loving one another, we want to build shrines.

2. Love, when genuinely expressed, has the power to change the world.

3. Loving one another is God’s Big Plan. And, whether we understand it or not, or agree with it or not, that’s what the plan is. It will succeed.

4. The world is full of angelic beings who are ready to help us.

5. Loving “the person you are with” is much harder than it sounds. This sometimes requires us to engage in tough love, which is not always easy or fun.

The transcript below comes from an extended video interview that Howard Storm did with filmmaker Matt Cline. The documentary is called “The Redemption of Howard Storm”. We watched this portion of Matt Cline’s documentary in class. I encourage you to do likewise. The YouTube video you want to watch is located here. The transcript below comes from 03:00 to 10:25.

When he [Jesus] told me that I had to come back to the world and I was trying to convince him not to send me back…, I asked him what would I do if I came back… Before he had a chance to answer, I said you know I am an artist and I would like to build a shrine for you… I would make this shrine so big and beautiful and bizarre that people would come from all over the world out of curiosity to see what it was about. And what they would find was it would be about you. And that would make them think about you. That’s what I would like to do if I came back.

He said, I would rather you didn’t do that.

And I said, “WHAT?!! People have been building shrines to you forever. There are lots of shrines. Why can’t I build a shrine? I would like to build a shrine.”

He said you spent so much of your life hiding out in the studio, avoiding people, I would prefer it if you didn’t avoid people by building this big shrine… I don’t really care about shrines. People like to build shrines. I understand that. It makes them feel good. It does absolutely nothing for me or for God. We don’t have any use for them whatsoever. If that’s what amuses you, I guess that’s what you gotta do. But don’t do it for me. Don’t deceive yourself into thinking it’s something I want or need, because I don’t.

I’m like, OK, you shot down my idea, what’s you’re idea of what would I do?

And he said, love the person that you’re with.

And I said, OK, great, I’ll do that. No problem. What do you want me to do?

He said, I just told you what I want you to do: love the person that you’re with.

And I said, Yeah, but after I do that, what do you really want me to do?

No, that is what I want you to do: love the person that you’re with.

I said well, that’s simple enough, that’s easy, I can do that.

And he said, oh really. Well, that’s what I want you to do. That’s enough.

And I said, how is it enough?

He said, if you do that, you’ll change the world.

And I said, oh, you want me to change the world?!

Exactly, that’s why put you in the world in the first place: to change the world.

Well you know there’s been a lot of people that have tried to change the world and they usually turn out really pretty badly. I can think of examples like Adolph Hitler, and Joseph Stalin, and Mao Tse-tung. All of them wanted to change the world and they made it worse. If I go back and try and change the world, why isn’t it possible that I could a lot of terrible mistakes and make the world a worse place?

The way that I want you to change the world is by loving the person you are with.

Wait a minute, that’s a contradiction. You want me to change the world but you just want me to love the person I’m with?

Yes, that’s the plan; that’s The Big Plan… If you love the person that you’re with, then they will go out and love the person that they’re with, and they will go out and love the person they’re with and it will be like a chain reaction and love will conquer the world and everyone will love one another. That’s God’s Big Plan.

It’s not going to work.

Why won’t it work?

I love the person I’m with. They walk across the street and get run over by a truck. Everyone gets angry and upset.

Yeah, that happens. But it’s really God’s plan and nothing is going to stop it. It’s going to happen.

Even if you had a million people, I don’t think it’s going to happen.

There’s more than a million people in the plan…

Well, from what I know of the world, you don’t have enough.

Actually, we have all the angels in the plan. There’s a lot of them. There are more angels than there are people in the world… There are millions of people. There are all the angels. There’s God. It’s inevitable. The plan is going to happen.

If that’s your plan, I’ll do it, but I just don’t really see much hope for it.

[And Jesus said], you don’t know enough to see how it’s going to happen.

So, my solution to everything is to love one another. And when I read the Bible and found out that that was written in the Bible as Jesus’ commandment: this is my commandment, that you love one another… that’s the program. I have tried to be part of that program… So, I personally have no big plan other than to be loving.

The only fly in the ointment was that I thought it was going to be easy, and it turns out to be the hardest thing I have ever done. It sounds so simple, but it’s really difficult. It’s easy for me to love my mother because she was a really nice woman and she was a very loving woman. It’s not hard to love someone who is really good and really loving. But what do you do with someone who is difficult, or really nasty? Those are hard people to love.

And what does it mean to love someone? Sometimes to love someone means you need to incarcerate them. And that’s not a lot of fun. Sometimes loving someone means you have to put as much distance between them and you as possible and tell them to never call you. And that’s not a lot of fun. Loving someone sounds so simple but it is very difficult…

Categories

Quotes

"Unlike spiritual paths that arose from the ideas and inner experiences of lone, isolated human beings, the path presented by near-death experiences is emerging as a direct, grassroots revelation that millions of people from all over the world are receiving and sharing. If we explore this newly emerging path deeply enough, we discover that all religions, philosophies, and cultures are honored; that science and spirituality are celebrated; that both the human and spiritual side of our natures are cherished and embraced. In short, near-death experiences present us with a universal, all-inclusive, perfectly integrated spiritual path that revolves around three core truths: 1. We are all one; 2. Love is the essence of life; 3. We are here, in this world, to become perfect embodiments of the Divine." -- David Sunfellow

“Merely learning about the near-death experience has effects similar to those reported by NDErs.” -- Kenneth Ring,
from "Lessons from the Light"

“For me personally, I’m showing more love to others now than before I started my near-death-experience studies. My understanding of near-death experiences has made me a better doctor. I face life with more courage and confidence. I believe NDErs really do bring back a piece of the afterlife. When NDErs share their remarkable experiences, I believe a piece of the afterlife, in some mysterious way, becomes available to us all.” -- Jeffrey Long, "Evidence of the Afterlife"

"I'm not asking you to believe anything. I'm simply telling you what I believe. And I have no idea what the next life will be like. Whatever I saw was only from the doorway, so to speak. But it was enough to convince me totally of two things from that moment on: One, that our consciousness does not cease with physical death; that it becomes, in fact, keener and more aware than ever. And secondly, that how we spend our time on earth, the kind of relationships we build, is vastly more important than we can know." -- George G. Ritchie, M.D., summarizing his famous near-death experience which helped launch the near-death experience movement. From his book, "Return From Tomorrow"

"Many events in my life I experienced, but not from how I remembered it, but from the point of view... [of] how the people, animals, environment experienced it around me. I felt it as my own. The times I had made others happy, and sad, I felt it all as they did. It was very apparent that every single thought, word, and action affects everything around us and indeed the entire universe. Trees, plants, animals too. I have been a long-term vegetarian since about 18 years old and I know this was appreciated and is a good choice in life. Spiritually it seemed to show proof of respect for all life, and even seemed to balance some of the negative and wicked things I have done in my life. In the life review we judge ourselves; no one else does. The light/god did not. But with no ego left -- and no lies -- we can't hide from what we have done and feel remorse and shame, especially in the presence of this love and light. Some of the things in life we think of as important don't seem to be so important there. But some of the insignificant things from the material human perspective are very important spiritually." -- Justin U describing his near-death experience on the NDERF website

"I have never interviewed anyone who had a near-death experience who told me that they came back to make more money or to spend more time at their jobs away from their families... Instead, they become convinced that they need to be more loving and kind. They react to their experience by living life to its fullest. They believe their lives have a purpose, even if that purpose is obscure to them. Invariably it involves concepts such as love of family or service to others. They seem to know that the love they create while living will be reflected and radiated back to them when they die." -- Melvin Morse, M.D., from his book, Parting Visions

“I went into this tunnel, and I came into this room that was just beautiful. God held me, He called me by name, and He told me, ‘Mary Jo, you can’t stay.’ And I wanted to stay. I protested. I said, ‘I can’t stay? Why not?’ And I started talking about all the reasons; I was a good wife, I was a good mother, I did 24-hour care with cancer patients. And He said, ‘Let me ask you one thing -- have you ever loved another the way you’ve been loved here?’ And I said, ‘No, it’s impossible. I’m a human.’ And then He just held me and said, ‘You can do better.’ ” -- Mary Jo Rapini, describing her near-death experience

"I asked them if there were other worlds. And they said, yes, the universe is full of other worlds -- and there are other dimensions of other physical universes and those are full of other worlds." -- Howard Storm describing his NDE in "My Descent Into Death"

"The Light kept changing into different figures, like Jesus, Buddha, Krishna, mandalas, archetypal images and signs. I asked the Light, “What is going on here? Please, Light, clarify yourself for me... The Light responded. The information transferred to me was that during your life after death experience your beliefs shape the kind of feedback you are getting before the Light. If you were a Buddhist or Catholic or Fundamentalist, you get a feedback loop of your own stuff. You have a chance to look at it and examine it, but most people do not. As the Light revealed itself to me, I became aware that what I was really seeing was our higher Self matrix." -- Mellen-Thomas Benedict

"God gave everything to us, everything is here -- this is where it's at. And what we are into now is God's exploration of God through us. People are so busy trying to become God that they ought to realize that we are already God and God is becoming us. That's what it is really about. When I realized this, I was finished with the void, and wanted to return to this creation..." -- Mellen-Thomas Benedict

“In one of my visits with the Light I was told that the near-death experience... would become more and more popular and it would have an affect on the entire world when a critical mass was hit and all these people have died and come back and are telling you that there is a lot more going on than we think." -- Mellen-Thomas Benedict